I'm in the 'mix it up' category, except I've pretty much eliminated annuals (except veggies) and tropicals. I want things that come back on their own as much as possible now. I'm not even going to hazard a guess at percents.... I have been removing some perennials and replacing them with small-ish shrubs in the last couple of years, and will likely continue to do so in the future.

Zinnias are perennial for me. They reseed and come back every year.

I don't think I have a single non-mixed border in my yard. Trees and shrubs and perennials all bear the same amount of weight for me when I am deciding what to put in a border. I do like zinnias and always have at least a hundred of them scattered throughout. Could use a few hundred actually.....
Use some coleus and caladium in the borders, and then some annuals in containers. Overall I'm a hardy type of gal. Although some types of annuals have been appealing to me lately and now that the beds are in fairly good shape I've been thinking about experimenting more with them.

I must be just past a winterkill line for zinnias and marigold, I don't think I've ever had one reseed...
This year was probably the first where I thought all the planting was more work than I wanted to do, but since I did do several bed expansions on top of all the plantings I'm hoping I still have a few years left in me.
I used to keep the annuals mostly in containers and separate beds but did end up experimenting and liked it. I just find they usually need more water and richer soil, so for me it's easier to pull up a shrub or a patch of overgrown perennials and do the annuals in the empty spot for a couple years until the perennials move back in.
I thought this was a nice mix at Chanticleer gardens, sorry about the garbage can. There was a little bit of everything.

I am all perennials. Flowers are secondary in my gardens. I use colored foliage texture and Garden Accoutrements so that I have interest all 4 seasons.

There are so many bushes and plant with white, red, purple, pink, yellow leaves who needs flowers every day?

I'm a mix of roses, bulbs, shrubs, and perennials. If I am thinking of quantity then I definitely have the most perennials planted but if we are talking about square footage then the roses probably win. I keep thinking I should add annuals but I can't figure out how to add yet another thing to my gardening chores. I just got grasses that I need to plant and have no idea how to use them so thank you for that wonderful photo Kato. I love the different textures and leaf colors!

The ratios actually are quite fluid for us. Roughly 3/4 of our current garden is under one year in the ground. But gardening here is year round, so change is much quicker than it would be for an area where there is a long dormant period.

Our personal garden beds are almost always a mix. As the shrubs get larger, the perennials and other flowers get moved to different beds. Some shrubs are placed with later removal planned; they act as fillers in the way some people use annuals. Those beds can become a new home for perennials. Obviously, I have no problems with cutting down, or digging up plants.

I plan for revolving shows in a single beds, too. Early bulbs give way to early perennials, to later perennials and biennials, followed by sub-shrubs, vines and background shrubs and grasses. There is something of visual interest at all times (not limited to flowers). My favorite base plants generally stay, but anything else can get switched out as desired. Probably 25 percent of the garden is changed every year early on, to keep it interesting, to experiment with what thrives where and trying out different plants.

Kato, I'm jealous! Do you live near Chanticleer? That is one of my favorite public gardens. Beautiful photo to really show the diversity.

Hi thyme, it's just under a two hour drive so 'close' is a relative thing. It's usually just a once a year visit depending on if I'd rather visit Longwood or not.
I thought the chanticleer bed was pretty good considering it's late in the season for most perennials.
Gyr- not sure if I've got the motivation to change out 25% of the plantings year to year, sounds like a lot of work!
Marquest- I frequently hear about the importance of foliage and I guess I do pay attention to keeping it interesting and varied, but I'm still completely into flowers. I think according to the gardening books that makes me a less mature gardener....

---Gyr- not sure if I've got the motivation to change out 25% of the plantings year to year, sounds like a lot of work! ---

lol I bet mine is a much smaller plot of land! I live in an expensive housing area (Southern California), so they don't toss in a lot of the land with the house. I am lucky to have more than some, but I am not able to do everything I would like with less than 8000 sq'.

I have almost an acre, and I probably am not a very "mature" gardener either. There was nothing here but 40 roses, two ash trees, two maples, two locusts and two McIntosh apple trees. The whole thing was bordered with lilacs. I like lilacs, but have ripped out about 70 ft of them, well, actually my neighbor did it for me with his bobcat. Also about 34 of the roses are history. How many Mr. Lincolns do you need really? They were given away. I have been planting fruit trees, raspberries, strawberries, asparagus. The deal with DH is that as long as the food crops come in, I can plant whatever flowers I want to in the spaces along the arsenic fence or in the pots too shady for vegs. I have a mix of things, I do some annuals just because I like them. I have been thinking about more shrubs and grasses, but haven't really made a good plan. Still dealing with the miles of landscape fabric impregnated with quackgrass and covered with rock and/or mulch that was around the roses.

kato

I think I see a banana and maybe a colocasia or alocasia there on the right? My EE type plants are about the only annuals I use, but I save them year to year, so they really aren't annuals.

Although they're the type of plant one would expect to see in a tropical garden, I think they work well with a whole bunch of regular perennial type things. IMO they may be tropicals, but they don't necessarily look tropical or out of place in our mixed gardens. They're simply big plants with very large leaves that look way cool. At least that's my way of thinking.

Kevin

I was curious as to how many people do this, a mixed border vs all perennials...but I also think it gives a longer show..

I have a few perennial beds which are bordered with colorful. long blooming annuals. I LOVE fibrous begonias. They do well in so many light aspects. They are pretty good regarding water conservation and they bloom until frost.

I also find for myself that having an organized border 'compensates' for a more random (read disorganized) display of perennials within the bed.

Rouge, a gardener after my own heart, lol! I am a mixer as well, but about two years ago I put in a border of white impatiens along one of my extensive shade gardens. Not only did it really light up the shade, but I found that it helped define it and more importantly in my yard, actually made it looked organized, lol! The following year I added them to the borders of several of the shade beds, giving my garden a unified look. Unfortunately the impatiens mildew going around put a kibosh on that plan this year, but maybe next year I'll try the begonias, if they will do well in shade.

For the last few years I have relied heavily on annuals, as I sold bouquets at the farmer's market, and would always be stuffing annuals here and there in the perennial beds when I ran out of room in the cutting garden. This year I did not sell, and my annuals portion of the garden decreased dramatically, but I continue to mix them in the perennial beds. Especially in my new (i.e. not fully planted) red/yellow/orange bed. I put many zinnias and marigolds in there this year, and while my tithonia seeds didn't germinate this year, I plan to never be without some tithonia in this bed.

I think annuals add a nice anchor to a bed of perennials, giving that constant (bloom, color, etc.) to a bed of change (perennial blooms).

Dee

kevin- There were plenty of elephant ears in another section, but I think what you're seeing is a pauwlonia that was cut back. For those who don't know, pauwlonia is a (invasive) tree that when cut back to the ground, sends up huge shoots with oversize leaves. A hardy plant you can trick into looking tropical. I've had them reach as much as 10 feet high with leaves 2 feet and more across (in one season). Here's a closeup of a small one (same bed, from a different picture).

Rouge, you're right that the begonias give a nice edge, and they look so healthy right now. Between them, the green arborvitae and your SAC blooming on the fence things really look fresh. I'm jealous of your green grass, haven't seen that around here since July.
Dee- I have the same thing going this year, I expanded a bed during July and there weren't many perennials I wanted to move in 90 degree heat, so I also went with annuals to fill in the first year. I started up a flat of zinnia seeds to transplant, took some coleus cuttings, found a couple selfsown amaranthus, and spread around some cannas and elephant ears. Even with many of the perennials petering out it still looks nice and full.
The only thing I noticed with my new beds is there's no place to rest your eyes.... everything is colorful, maybe too much so. I'm thinking of adding more stuff that's just green and not fighting so much for attention.

I'm jealous of your green grass

If I zoomed in more you would see lots of healthy green....clover :(.

Still experimenting to figure out what works best for me but i will say that when I've tried laying our gardens with perennials only (maybe a sprinkled annual or biennial, too) they don't start to really sing until a shrub ends up in there. Most of which kind of happened by accident. I don't have much interest in tropicals with the exception of the few cannas and elephant ears I have in containers and I couldn't do without clematis. I don't do many annuals either (except a few herbs, chili peppers, etc). The border that runs along the fence line (previous owner establish) has some ornamental type trees and shrubs. The other perennials that are in that area are mostly ditch daylilies and a huge clump of hydrangeas. My plan is to eventually decorate the area with more perennials and self-seeding annuals. I think a mix is much more appealing. MIX ON!!!

I grow everything together...perennials, annuals, veggies, bulbs, shrubs, trees, containers. My goal is bloom all the time with nice foliage and scented flowers, and food for the birds and the bees.

Interesting that the year I retired from 30 years of teaching, I planted everything with proper spacing, like they were my students in a carefully structured classroom. I guess I needed the transition! lol.That lasted a year and then I went back to my mixed up gardens.

--Interesting that the year I retired from 30 years of teaching, I planted everything with proper spacing, like they were my students in a carefully structured classroom. ---

Funny! :) Isn't it interesting how our experiences influence our visual perception? And it works the other way too, outside in. Over in the decorating forum, the height of artwork on walls was a a hot topic. The majority stress eye-level. But everything cluttered eye-level and below with bare walls to the vaulted ceiling just looks wrong and unbalanced to me! So I thought about it, and then the reason why dawned. As a landscape designer, I don't just view what is straight ahead, and below. I am looking at the visual balance from ground level to the tops of the trees, rooflines, pergolas etc! Eye-catchers are as likely to be above eye-level as even-to-below in my outdoor experience. So I hang our artwork quite a bit higher than home designers do. I refuse to think of it as "wrong", because it is comfortable to my visual space. But the interior designers would likely all cringe visiting my home. lol

edit to fix my spelling

This post was edited by Gyr_Falcon on Mon, Sep 9, 13 at 16:25